


Self-Doubt

by Angelscythe



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Asexual Character, LGBTQ Themes, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-29
Updated: 2020-06-29
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:22:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24988240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angelscythe/pseuds/Angelscythe
Summary: It has been so long since Felix knows he loves Sylvain but he will never be with him. He doesn't want to trap him under conditions that might not suit him.But Ingrid & Garreg Mach aren't really agreeing with him...
Relationships: Felix Hugo Fraldarius & Ingrid Brandl Galatea, Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier
Comments: 2
Kudos: 22





	Self-Doubt

**Author's Note:**

> Hi!!  
> Before you'd read this, I wanted to say, I'm myself Ace (sex reluctant) and I actually used a lot of things that has been said to me, and self-doubt and fear to write this down!
> 
> Also, sorry for the mistakes !! I struggled all the month to manage to get this fic done and I really wanted to post it for the Pride Month and so it's still filled with mistakes and error probably.  
> Anyway, thank you for reading this if you do and remember: stay hydrated and wear a mask when you go outside !!! Normalize saying 'I love you' to people you care for!!!!

The head pressed against the window of the carriage that was bringing him to Garreg Mach. To his friends, to his Destiny. And he didn’t want to arrive at Garreg Mach. His father’s words were still echoing in his mind. Not those about being a great Knight, even though it was disgusting him, or those about meeting Dimitri soon, and Sothis, he really wasn’t ready for that… But… Those words telling him he might find a girlfriend, have heir…

It wasn’t the first time his father would talk about that.

He was the only one who could spread the Crest of Fraldarius now… His uncle, perhaps could provide heir but his father preferred the heritage of the family to fall upon his son. And then his grandson, etc. While Felix could understand those wishes, he hated those discussions more than anything…

If he had dared to talk with his father, perhaps he could escape from them? Stop feeling that oppression, stop feeling like he was a disappointment. But he couldn’t tell it to him. He had told it to no one… Except Ingrid. He knew he could trust her and yet, when he had seen her looks, the interrogation in her eyes…

For a moment, he also thought about telling it to Sylvain because he was his best friend and he trusted him. But on the other hand… he was afraid. If he told that to Sylvain, it would be the end of everything. The end of his dreams…

And he wasn’t ready to close his eyes on this forever.

If he could keep just one little thing…

Just for him, in the very core of his heart…

“FELIX!!!”

Felix hadn’t the time to walk down from the carriage, his little cape almost falling because he tried to remove it when the car stopped, that a big body caught him and made him swirl in the air.

“Put me down! Put me down!!” he asked, shaking of fear.

His feet touched the floor and he groaned.

“I’m sorry! I was so excited to see you! It’s been so long!”

“It’s been two weeks!” Felix protested.

“So. Long.”

“Felix!”

Felix turned the head to look at Ingrid who jogged toward him.

“We were waiting for you! And I see Sylvain is really much more excited to see you than me,” she smiled widely.

Felix frowned.

“That’s just because you would hit me!” Sylvain protested to her.

“So, I should hit you,” Felix coldly said, walking to the carriage to grab his belongings.

It was a few bags with clothes, two books he never read but one of them used to be Glenn’s and a bunch of swords and knives.

“Need a hand?”

“Sylvain, I’m not a child!”

Felix stepped away with his bags and walked toward the Monastery. He didn’t doubt there was uniform in his room. He might have to try them but except that, it will be okay. He wasn’t ready for this whole year of study, but he was ready anyway.

It was just something he had to do.

“But I can accompany you,” Sylvain insisted, walking after him. “You’re not far away from my room! And glad for me…” He winked to a pretty nun who passed there. “I’m far away from Ingrid.”

Ingrid quickly walked after them.

“You should already know, Gautier, that nothing can stop me from beating your ass if you’re doing something wrong! We have to study one year here, don’t start to try having an affair with everybody and making this year hell.”

“Don’t worry,” Felix cut short.

Both looked at him with surprise.

“It will be Hell but it won’t be because of him.”

Ingrid sighed. “Of course.”

“If you’re far away from me, it’s better like that,” Felix pursued. “If I here you doing _anything_ I will come castrate you!”

“My baby boy!” Ingrid smiled.

“Well…” Sylvain winked to a lady that smiled, the cheeks red. “Get ready to come touch my…”

“EURK!” they both said on the same time.

“Come on!” Sylvain laughed. “Anyway…”

“Be careful,” Ingrid warned as they walked toward the dormitories.

“You and I, Felix, are next to each other, there is just one room between us…”

“Who came studying here?” Felix cut short.

“My cousin!”

“No, he meant in the Blue Lions, I think,” Ingrid said.

“Your cousin?” Felix repeated.

“You know, Ferdinand Von Aegir! Coming from the Empire!”

“Ah yes, I meant the Blue Lions.”

“Annette, the daughter of Gustave, will be there,” Ingrid replied. “And I heard a girl who originally lived in the Empire, too, will be in the Blue Lions. With that, there is Lord Lonato’s son.”

Felix frowned. “Didn’t he do his studies with Glenn?” he whispered.

“Not Christophe. His adoptive son,” Sylvain corrected. “That bug guy from Duscur is there too.”

“Dedue?” Felix asked. He frowned. And stopped, the bags slipping from his fingers. “He wouldn’t come alone, isn’t it?”

Sylvain leaned to take the bag.

“Yeah…”

“So the one who is in the room beside mine…” Felix groaned.

“Yep.”

“Ingrid, let’s change our rooms!” Felix asked.

“You can’t go with the girls!” Sylvain protested. “But that’s a brilliant idea. Felix, can I share your room?!”

“No,” he groaned back.

“As much I would love it, you know I can’t,” Ingrid said. “But it’s fine… it’s the occasion to be friend with Dimitri again, no?”

“No,” Felix groaned. “My stuff, Sylvain,” he commanded, looking tense.

“I help you.”

Felix growled even more. “But walk faster,” he said.

“Said the one with the tiny legs,” Sylvain smiled.

Together, they arrived in Felix’s room and, indeed, the uniforms were there, waiting for him on the chest of drawer. He had to check if they fit and he also had to install himself here.

“It’s good,” Felix said.

“You want us to leave?” Sylvain asked.

“Only you, Ingrid can bring me in her room.”

“Lucky you!” Sylvain smiled.

He approached Felix and held out his arms.

Felix looked at him and then approached him, slowly. The arms closed around him and he wanted to hug him back.

“I’m at the beginning of the corridor,” Ingrid said, walking toward the door.

Felix glanced above Sylvain’s shoulder, coming on his tip toe. Just his eyes peaked. And he suddenly tripped. Sylvain arms closed a bit more around him.

“I got you.”

“Thanks,” he mumbled, passing his arms around him. “Just two seconds, Sylvain…”

“Yeah.” He gently caressed his hair. “Everything will be alright. Don’t be afraid of Dimitri. You know he won’t do any harm. You know him!”

“Yes… That’s the problem: I know him. You haven’t seen what he has done…”

“Felix…” Sylvain sighed.

He moved away but Felix closed his arms around him, harder.

Sylvain smiled.

“More?” he gently asked.

“If when I pull back, I see you smile…”

Sylvain hugged him and hid his face in his neck.

“You can’t see anything now!”

“Idiot…” Felix whispered. “Just a few more seconds,” he asked.

“You can stay as much as you’d want,” the big redhead replied.

“Hm…”

Sylvain was sure to have heard ‘thank you’ and he enjoyed this soft hug. It was so rare, how could he be not delighted by this?

**_Knock knock knock._ **

“Ingrid?”

“Yes, come!”

The door pushed open. Felix entered inside, still wearing his clothes from Faerghus, except he had removed the little cape. His cheeks a bit red must be the sign of being too hot. They weren’t used to such a climate in Faerghus!

He also could notice it with Ingrid, wearing her hair above her head, tied with a ribbon. And she had just something looking like a corsage, but less restrictive… Less tightened around her muscles.

“So?” she smiled. “You told him?”

“Told him what?!” he groaned.

“Felix, don’t be an idiot! You love him and he loves you! What are you waiting for?”

Felix bit his lower lip as he walked toward the bed. He glanced at her, his eyes, seeming to say ‘can I?’ and since she nodded, he installed himself at the edge of the mattress, his lips pinched and his nails digging in the heels of his palms.

“You know what the problem is,” he whispered.

“I still don’t understand,” she recognized, coming next to him.

But not sitting next to him.

“I don’t want what he wants. I will never be able to give him what he wants… Just the idea of forcing myself to give him what he wants…”

Ingrid stared at him.

Not in the same way that the first time. Because the very first time, more or less one year ago, when he stated this to her, when he told her the simple idea of having sex with someone was disgusting him, almost panicking him because he knew people expected him to force himself to do that, she couldn’t understand. It seemed so weird. How someone could not want this in their life?

In fact, that discussion had been even stranger because back then, they were talking about their negligence with their appearance. And when she teased him about ‘not being able to get a girl if he looked like that’, playing around, she expected him to confess his feelings for Sylvain… Not telling her he didn’t want to attract anyone because he was _afraid_. She could understand doubts, she herself had lost of question about all of this and no one to reply to her.

But the fact he was really afraid…

And until now, it was what prevented him to go confess and it infuriated her.

Not that he was afraid, though she had known him more courageous, but more that he couldn’t grab that happiness that was just within his grasp. For Sothis Sake, when she saw him and Sylvain, talk, laugh… it was so obvious they loved each other beyond everything and she just couldn’t understand how they could not be together.

“I don’t think you will force yourself or anything,” Ingrid replied.

“Of course I won’t,” Felix said, determined.

“Because, once you will become together, it will be natural and you will do it without problems!” she smiled.

“What the… the fucking hell, Ingrid?! Are you listening to me when I talk?!”

She frowned. “You don’t think so?”

“No, I don’t think so. The mere idea of this **_thing_** in me is making me retch.” He brought his feet on the mattress and pressed his cheek on his knees, circling those with his arms. “In fact… I already thought I could ask him out and tell him to just… go have fun with those ladies. But I would be too jealous, too afraid he would prefer them to me because I can’t give him what he wants… I’m afraid to taste this delight to see it taken away from me because I’m abnormal.”

“You’re not abnormal,” Ingrid protested.

“You don’t think it. I already saw your face and the way… I know I’m not thinking like you. You’re not wrong… and that makes me…”

Felix closed his lips.

They got those kinds of conversation so often. He told him so often he was afraid of a relationship because he faired the moment he will have to force himself because he would be terrified to lose the one he loved. And what if he made gestures that might excite his partner, he still dreamed it could be Sylvain, and he had no choices to…

The mere idea was bringing shiver within him.

And to this day, he still hated Ingrid asking him if ‘something happened in your past’. For days, she investigated because she was sure something must have provoked this. In her mind, he couldn’t feel so little interest, such an absent interest, in that thing so natural for others without a reason?

He hated that she believed it was ‘just for now’ or he had lived a traumatism or even believing he had to wait, he was still a bit young… The fact was that, at this age, when most of his comrades had interest into it, he had none of it and while he could use this time to profit to train more, he knew he was just… weird.

To their eyes.

And so… to his eyes, in the end.

Because… No one was like him. He never found someone like him. And in this case… if no one was like him…

“Felix…”

Ingrid sat next to him. She wanted to take him in her arms but she knew she hadn’t that right. She wasn’t Sylvain… Only Sylvain was truly allowed to hug him.

“Perhaps that’s a discussion you should have _with him_.”

Felix shook his head.

He knew Sylvain, he knew himself. One day, he will just fake it not to lose him and he was afraid this might be the way he will actually lose him…

When you came from Faerghus, it was weird how Garreg Mach, in those warmth season, could be that hot. For most of the Blue Lions, not Mercedes who was used to worse and Dedue who came from somewhere already warmer, or with a wind less cold at least, it was Hell. Doing training with Jeritza added to those temperatures around?

Hopefully, they had found a little pond in the forest of Garreg Mach, under the roof of foliage, and, according to Dimitri, there was no monsters around, no brigands… just the heat to be afraid off.

You should have stared at Ingrid and Sylvain to know which one of them removed their clothes the fastest. Ingrid wasn’t afraid of Sylvain’s possible desire, not with her. He didn’t saw her like a possible ‘prey’. And she didn’t fear Ashe who looked away or Dimitri who stuttered or even Dedue, Annette and Mercedes. And certainly not Felix who was too busy looking at every freckles spreading on Sylvain’s broad muscles as he was sitting in the edge of the pond and splashing himself with the cold water.

“Do you need help?” Ingrid smiled.

“If you push me in the water, I swear to Sothis…”

“If anyone push Sylvain in the water, that would be the last thing they would do,” Felix warned with anger.

He knew how Sylvain was afraid of water, and closed space, since Miklan had tried to… ah, so many things. Drown him, make him die by pushing him in a well and what else? The list was too big…

Sylvain smiled to him.

“You don’t come in the water, Fe’?” he called.

Felix shook his head, his back pressing against the tree he was leaning to.

“I’m fine there,” he replied.

Mercedes gently pushed Dedue toward the pond as he seemed doubtful about coming there. She hadn’t removed any clothes and the next courageous one was Ashe who actually was used to such things. He came in the water and Ingrid threw him a look.

“Help me,” she said. “I’m too afraid of Felix but we can splash Sylvain!”

“He looks like he suffers from heat so I volunteer,” Ashe smiled.

“What are you plotting?!” Sylvain asked.

“This!”

They both threw water at him. He let out a surprised scream but then laughed. This was fine.

“Dima, help!” he yelled.

“I’m coming!” Dimitri replied.

He jumped in the pond, splashing even more Sylvain and caught Ingrid, lifting her and making her laugh and grab him. She let out a ‘nooooo’ but Dimitri was way stronger than her.

“I’m coming to help!” Annette screamed.

She dashed to the edge of the pond but didn’t jump in there, still clothed. She summoned magic and wind threw wave of water on the Highness and Ingrid.

They all laughed. And as Mercedes pushed Dedue to enter the water, and the festivity, seeing his desire in his eyes, Sylvain got up and moved away. The young lady noticed him and came to him, holding out a towel.

“I’m fine. But tell me… you don’t mind being wet?”

He winked.

“I don’t mind! Without wink!” she said, pressed her finger on his nose.

“Delightful!”

He grabbed her and hugged her, making her gently giggle and pasting her clothes to her skin.

She pressed a kiss on his cheek and he hugged her a bit more before letting go of her and walking toward Felix, still sit under the big tree. He was drying his hair, ruffling them in the showel, and walked to his best friend. His dear friend.

“You stay there?” he asked. “You don’t come to play with others?”

“I’m fine here.”

“Doing nothing.”

“Doing nothing.”

“Can I share the shadow of that tree with you?”

“Yes,” Felix replied.

He caressed his body with his eyes. And then went back, jumping from freckle to freckle, following the curves of some droplets sliding along his muscles, losing under his underwear, discovering his thighs.

“It’s so hot here,” Sylvain said.

He moved the arm to pass it around Felix’s shoulders.

“Don’t touch me,” Felix cut short.

Not now.

Not in public.

Sylvain knew it and he apologized as he kept dry himself. He felt a bit fresher and it was good.

And he stayed there, by his side…

For minutes, and almost one whole hour before the others started to leave. First Mercedes with Annette because this last one wanted to study; then Ashe who felt a bit annoyed to be all alone with all those high Nobles. And so, Dimitri with Dedue, knowing it would annoy the others, at least Felix and Ingrid perhaps, left at their turn. So, almost two hours after they came here, it only remained Sylvain, Felix and Ingrid who tried to dry her hair, starting by wringing that so long mane of her.

“Do you want to go back in the pond before we leave?” Felix asked, getting up.

“Go in the pond?” Sylvain repeated.

“Yes. I’m going to swim a little. So if you want to come.”

He smiled and removed his vest, his shirt, his boots, his garter and his trouser. Then, he walked toward the pond and toward the little stairs made with stones. The staff of Garreg Mach knew the teenagers went often her, the Blue Lions knew about it from almost everybody from their housing except Mercedes and Dedue who had no people who came here before, and so they installed this to avoid accident.

“Wait for me, Fe’!”

Sylvain followed him but arrived to the stairs, he seemed to hesitate. Felix held out his hand to him. Sylvain grabbed him and came in the pond, his toes digging in the sludge.

Felix was still holding his hand but he moved the other one to remove the red ribbon in his hair.

“Let me help you,” Sylvain smiled.

Felix didn’t protest.

He watched at him.

One day, Ingrid asked him ‘do you love him?’ and he replied ‘yes’ with sadness because he could never be with him. Ingrid might have misunderstood his reaction and that’s why she told him ‘you know, he loves you’. He didn’t know if it was a fact he once told her or if she had guessed it. In fact… he supposed she might have just guessed it because, when he watched him like that… Sylvain’s love, their love was so obvious…

But it was a forbidden fruit he couldn’t bit into… even though he wanted to bit in it so strongly…

If he could… touch his pectoral, brush his skin, trace the drawings made by his freckle. Kiss his lips…

“Do you need it?” Sylvain asked, showing the ribbon.

“What? You want to keep it for you?” Felix smirked.

Ingrid glanced at them then moved away from the pond, letting them together.

“Yes,” Sylvain replied. “Can I?”

Felix nodded. Sylvain let go of his hand but Felix slid his on his wrist to support him while he was tying the ribbon around his wrist.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Felix replied.

He brushed the ribbon where it was tied. Brushed his wrist on the same time.

“Fe’…”

Sylvain gently lifted his chin, leaned toward him.

“Syl’… you can’t do that.”

“I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“I can’t give you what you want,” Felix said.

“I want you,” Sylvain stated.

“I know. And I can’t give it to you…”

Sylvain frowned. He didn’t understand. His look, his smile, their tenderness… were they only an illusion? Was he dreaming of it, of them?

Perhaps…

“I understand,” he said. “I won’t force you of anything. I’m glad with your friendship.”

“I’m glad with your friendship.”

“Can I hug you, at least?” Sylvain smiled shyly.

“Yes. You can always hug me.”

“I will always ask you,” he swore.

He hugged him tenderly and pressed a kiss on his cheekbone.

_Knock knock knock._

Felix was about to blow the candles and install himself for a night of insomnia, like always, his dreams always filled with what he had seen Dimitri’s doing, with how he imaged Glenn’s death… but he couldn’t now.

A part of him hoped for Sylvain but it was ridiculous.

Why Sylvain would come?

He certainly had found a girl or two to pass the night with. To forget that missed kiss earlier.

He moved toward the front door and tugged it toward him, a knife in his hand. Just in case it wasn’t Sylvain.

And it wasn’t Sylvain.

But it wasn’t someone who deserved his knife neither…

“Good night. I don’t disturb you, isn’t it?”

“You can come… It’s not as if I was thrilled to go to bed,” he smirked.

“Thank you.”

Ingrid stepped inside, moved toward the last light of the room, the flame reverberating in the window.

“Can I?”

“Yes.”

Ingrid sat on the mattress.

“I saw you, earlier, with Sylvain…”

“Yeah. Thank for having leave us and let us intimacy,” he replied.

“I mean, when you were looking at him like that,” she smiled.

Felix rose a brow.

“And?”

“I mean, come on! You can’t look a man like that and have no desire!”

Felix froze. “Ingrid…”

“I’m telling it for you. If there is something special, something else I can help you with?”

“That’s not because I appreciate the beauty of his body that I want his dick to fuck me!” Felix shouted.

Ingrid looked shocked but Felix didn’t mind. He was just afraid someone else might have heard that. And… No, in fact, he didn’t care. He had to learn to hide his feeling way more but he didn’t care right now because there was that ball in his guts. He wanted to yell way much more at Ingrid because she couldn’t _understand_.

“It’s for you, Felix… I don’t want to see you passing next to happiness and…”

“Can we stop having this conversation again and again? I won’t change. I won’t…” Felix bit his lower lip with so much anger, blood started to slide along his chin. “I won’t be like you. I don’t _want_ to change. Certainly not to fit in…”

He wanted to say ‘fit in your society’ but he also knew that wasn’t what Ingrid meant.

He hoped.

She was certainly tired to see them so close but with him pulling back each time he could get his chance with the only one mattering for him. But why did she refused to understand?! Understand the pain in his heart.

He was trying to save Sylvain, save their friendship…

He was afraid and he didn’t want to show this more. If she could understand… If only he could not have to put words on those feelings…

“You know…”

Felix stared at her.

“He loves you. He would be able to do anything for you…”

“That’s what you’re saying,” Felix groaned.

“That’s… That’s what he told me.”

“He meant take the Stars out of the sky, he meant buying a million flowers but not…”

“Not have sex? Why we wouldn’t figure it out?” she asked, walking toward the door.

She let out a hiccup as a knife entered the wooden door at a few centimeters of her nose.

“Do that, Ingrid and the next one…”

“You’re an idiot!” she protested. “You two are almost a couple already! The only things you don’t do is having sex and kissing. And you’re fine with not doing one of those so what might change!”

“I’m fine not doing any of that!”

Lie.

He wanted to have Sylvain’s broad arms around him, he wanted to snuggle in his arms, cuddle with him. He wanted to see his smile and smell his soft citrus smell when they were together. He wanted to have his head on his lap, like it happened by the past, and he would touch his hair, caress them, look at him, look at his smile, here his laugh. He would…

But he couldn’t.

He had put distance between them, or he tried so, because they weren’t teenager anymore, they were about to become men and he wasn’t the one Sylvain truly wanted…

“You’re killing me,” Ingrid said. “You’re really…” She sighed. “One day, you will wake up and realize you did something wrong.”

“Ingrid… Every day, I wake up and I know I messed up. You can’t understand… If it could be that simple. If I could erase those fears, I would do it. If being with Sylvain was that simple… But it isn’t simple, at all. I… You know what I feel for Sylvain and that’s why I don’t want to hurt him.” He sighed and passed his hand on his face. “I appreciate your concern but it just looks like you can’t understand.”

“I’m trying,” she swore. “I’m trying very hard.”

“Thank you…”

But sometimes, trying wasn’t enough. He had the feeling Ingrid wasn’t trying enough. And he also knew this was wrong because, obviously, she did. But since she just made him feel uncomfortable…

He knew she was trying to help but while doing that, it was just making him realize how weird and different he was.

He just thought… perhaps if he was more like her, more like Sylvain, he could be happy. He couldn’t erase the doubts, the fear…

And it was condemned to this unhappiness he was feeling…

He couldn’t sleep. It had been like that for months.

In his room, alone, Sylvain stared at the ribbon that never left his wrist since the day Felix allowed him to tie it here. And since then, he had the feeling Felix was walking away from him.

He went too far.

He frightened him with his feelings…

Ingrid had told him he loved him too but she certainly had mistaken the information. Felix was so weird in regard of feelings that he might just have said he loved him… as a friend?

But now he was so afraid to have lost him.

He couldn’t lose him…

He refused to lose him!

He should lie to him, telling him he didn’t like him that way, he was fooling around. He couldn’t lose him… He couldn’t… He knew Felix was very busy with his training but he also had the feeling that he was trying… too much. Always having a word to run away. Always having a ridicule reason to leave…

Sylvain got up from his bed and came outside the room and walked toward Felix’s.

He hesitated.

He should knock.

He should try…

But he should perhaps, leave away? Stop trying to infill the distance, infill the absence, making sure they still would be bonded…

Perhaps if he stepped away, Felix would come back to him?

But he was afraid this won’t work that way. What if Felix took this opportunity and just ran away? If that was what he wanted, of course, he would let him run away. He wanted his happiness first!

But… if he could do something.

He gathered his courage and knocked at the door.

He heard a groan.

“Yeah?” a voice said from inside.

Sylvain pushed open the door and entered in the darkness.

“It’s me, Fe’. I couldn’t sleep so…”

“I couldn’t neither…” Felix replied.

“So it doesn’t disturb you if I come?” Sylvain asked, walking toward the bed.

“It doesn’t. Here,” he said, rolling on the side to let him come in the bed.

Thanks to the light coming a bit from the window, the Moon and the Stars working for him, and also his eyes starting to get used to the darkness, helped him to see he was allowed in the bed. And Felix had let him a big place.

He was almost stuck against the wall, on his side.

“Fe’…” he softly said. “Don’t you want to come in my arms, instead?” he offered. “Ah… I mean… Sorry,” he replied.

“Why are you saying ‘sorry’?”

“It’s just… I don’t want you to feel I’m hitting on you too hard…”

“You’re always like that. Come here,” Felix said.

The big redhead approached him and sat on the mattress. He lied by his side and took him in his arms with tenderness.

“It’s fine then?”

“Yeah.”

“I was afraid we wouldn’t be friend anymore.”

Felix pressed his head on his chest, listening to his heart beating. Such a soft sound. He loved it so much…

“You were concerned about that too?” he whispered.

“Of course! I care you so much, Fe’. I don’t want to lose you. No matter what.”

“No matter what?”

Sylvain nodded, gently squeezing his shoulder.

“Since we’re at Garreg Mach, I’ve the feeling you stepped away from me… You’re distant.”

“I… I just… crave for something and I couldn’t take the risk to hurt you. If you believed…”

“Just… Tell me, Fe’. Ingrid told me…”

Felix froze when he noticed the ribbon around his wrist.

“I love you,” he said.

“Yeah, this…” Sylvain whispered. “It is true?”

Felix pressed his head on his chest.

“I’ve something to ask you before…”

If he hadn’t understood that he was really telling him ‘I love you’, he got another chance to save himself.

Them.

He was feeling a bit better at the idea that, no matter what, they would stay friend. But he was also afraid because if they tried, if one of them did something wrong… it would be over. Nothing could save them.

Not even their will…

“Anything you want, Fe’?”

“Do you… Are you…” Felix sighed. “Do you desire me, sexually?”

“Of course,” he said.

“Would you be sad if you couldn’t have sex with me?”

“Sad? No… Sex isn’t all in a relationship. I love you since so long and all I enjoyed was your presence, your words, your smile when I was allowed to see it…”

Felix moved in his arms. “I love you, Sylvain…”

“Fe’!”

“But…”

“But?” Sylvain whispered.

“But we will never have sex… Never. I have no interest in it. It disgusts me… So if you decided to be with me… You could never have that from me… I… thought I could let you go away to have sex but I’m too afraid to lose you,” he whispered. “But if really you would need it perhaps, we can talk about it later. For now… For now, I would like to keep you for me a bit longer. Just for me… If you still want me.”

“Felix… Of course, I want you. I love you. I don’t care about having sex with you if that makes you uncomfortable. I will never force you…”

“You’re sure? You always had affair with ladies.”

Sylvain shrugged.

“I did, but I didn’t love them. It’s different for you. I love you. I want to be with you, cuddle you, kiss you. And if this is all I can have, I’m delighted. And if I go too far, tell it to me. Because I don’t know your limits. Never hesitate. Because I don’t want you to suffer. Especially not for me.”

Felix stared at him.

“You want to kiss me?”

“Of course,” Sylvain smiled, caressing his back.

“Then… kiss me?” Felix said under his breath.

“With pleasure,” Sylvain replied.

He leaned toward him, kissing the lips he dreamed to kiss since so long…


End file.
